Terry Eugene Sears v. Jennifer A. Haas ( 2013 )

Case: 12-14445 Date Filed: 02/19/2013 Page: 1 of 4
[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
________________________
No. 12-14445
Non-Argument Calendar
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D.C. Docket No. 3:12-cv-00247-LC-CJK
TERRY EUGENE SEARS,
Plaintiff - Appellant,
versus
JENNIFER A. HAAS,
Asst. Warden,
J. F. KOLODZIEJ,
Major,
R. LEE,
Captain,
A. WILLIAMS,
P. J. GERMAIN,
Lieutenant, et al.,
Defendants - Appellees.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Florida
________________________
(February 19, 2013)
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Before HULL, MARTIN and KRAVITCH, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Terry Sears, a Florida inmate proceeding pro se, appeals the district court’s
sua sponte dismissal without prejudice of his 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action for abuse of
the judicial process under 28 U.S.C. § 1915A(b)(1). After review, we affirm.
Sears filed suit against 15 officers of the Santa Rosa Correctional Institute
using a civil rights complaint form. That form directed him to disclose all state
and federal court actions he had filed related to the conditions of his confinement
and any federal actions that had been dismissed prior to service. Further, the form
warned, “FAILURE TO DISCLOSE ALL PRIOR CIVIL CASES MAY RESULT
IN THE DISMISSAL OF THIS CASE,” and it emphasized that, even if Sears was
unsure of any prior cases he had filed, he was also required to disclose that fact.
Sears listed several cases. And he swore under penalty of perjury that the
statements in the complaint were true. But a magistrate judge found Sears had
failed to disclose a case he had filed five months earlier against Santa Rosa
officials. And he had also failed to disclose a 2006 case that had been dismissed
prior to service for failure to state a claim. The magistrate judge therefore
recommended that Sears’s complaint be dismissed without prejudice as malicious
for abuse of the judicial process. Sears objected that his omissions were
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inadvertent. But the district court overruled those objections, adopted the
magistrate’s recommendation, and dismissed Sears’s case. 1 This is Sears’s appeal.
The district court did not err in dismissing Sears’s complaint. District courts
must review all civil claims filed by prisoners against government entities or
officers before or soon after docketing to determine whether they are frivolous,
malicious, fail to state a claim, or seek damages from an immune defendant. 28
U.S.C. § 1915A(a), (b). In the analogous context of the dismissal of a suit as
malicious under § 1915(e)(2)(B)(i), we have explained that failure to comply with
court rules requiring disclosures about a plaintiff’s previous litigation constitutes
an abuse of the judicial process warranting dismissal. See Attwood v. Singletary,
105 F.3d 610, 613 (11th Cir. 1997); see also Rivera v. Allin, 144 F.3d 719, 731
(11th Cir. 1998) (observing that lying under penalty of perjury is the kind of abuse
of process that warrants dismissal), abrogated on other grounds by Jones v. Bock,
549 U.S. 199 (2007). Although pro se pleadings are held to a less stringent
standard, a plaintiff’s pro se status does not excuse mistakes regarding procedural
rules. McNeil v. United States, 508 U.S. 106, 113 (1993).
Sears conceded he failed to comply with the court’s procedural rules about
disclosing cases he previously had filed. And on appeal, he argues only that his
case has merit. That gives us no basis upon which to conclude the district court
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Sears contends he should have been permitted to refile. But his case was dismissed without prejudice, so he may.
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was wrong to dismiss his case without prejudice for failure to comply with
reasonable and clearly articulated requirements for pro se civil rights complaints.
AFFIRMED.
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